


The Snowball Game

by didipickles



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Brother-Sister Relationships, Season 2ish Alexis and David, Snowball Fight, Young Alexis and David
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-13
Updated: 2019-10-13
Packaged: 2020-12-14 15:24:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21017999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/didipickles/pseuds/didipickles
Summary: Two very different snowball fights from the life of Alexis Rose.





	The Snowball Game

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [SCFrozenOver](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/SCFrozenOver) collection. 

> **Prompt:**  
Alexis and David's first snowball fight. Either when they were kids, or as adults, in Schitt's Creek, because they never had a snowball fight as kids.
> 
>   
Thank you to this-is-not-nothing for being a consistent cheerleader, an idea machine, and a wonderful beta.
> 
> Title is a reference to ["The Circle Game" by Joni Mitchell](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGHjHU_Z8d8)

** _Winter, 1997_ **

Alexis loved the snow. She loved how it made everything sparkle and shine. She loved the crunch of her new boots on the fresh powder as she walked around the mansion's grounds. 

This was the first year she'd actually spent any time outside once it snowed, since Adelina didn't like the cold and didn't want Alexis wandering off where she couldn't see her. But Alexis was finally tasting freedom, and despite the brisk air on her cheeks she was warm down to her toes. Something about being on her own in the estate, making her own choices and going where she pleased, made her feel like a grown-up. Her mother wouldn't be caught dead out in the snow, and Alexis felt strong doing something not even her mother could do.

Giggling, she started to skip. Adelina had dressed her in an atrocious set of snow pants under her puffy coat, so when she came across a snow bank, Alexis took a flying leap and landed with a dull thud on her side. Still laughing, she turned onto her back and started to make a snow angel. Part of her believed that it was something people only did in movies, and she wanted to see if it would really work. When she stood and turned around, she let out a delighted little squeal. "An Alexis angel!" She clapped her hands and fell onto the spot next to it, over and over until she had a whole fleet of Alexis-sized snow angels.

Alexis walked back and forth in front of her new army of delicate protectors, shaking the snow that had crystallized onto her hat and hair. Once satisfied that each angel fit her standards, she turned around and headed back toward the house, day-dreaming of hot chocolate and the new blanket Eli gave her for Hanukkah (she'd delighted everyone by identifying it immediately as Icelandic eiderdown). She'd taken four steps when - WHAP! Something hit her square in the back. With an angry cry Alexis whipped around to see David about 20 feet away, doubled over with laughter. 

"David!" Alexis realized that David wasn't dressed for the cold, only wearing a sweater with no jacket. She considered going easy on him, right up until he packed another snowball and hurled it at her. Yelping, she dodged it at the last second and then narrowed her eyes. Stupid teenagers. 

Grateful for the thick gloves Adelina had insisted she wear, Alexis bent down and quickly made her own snowball. She took a second to size up the distance and then threw it, missing David by inches. Immediately she ran to her snow angel army and went up and over the bank, giving her some shallow coverage while David retaliated, laughing and throwing snowballs that had no chance of hitting her. 

"Guess you should have stayed in little league!" Alexis yelled, popping up and chucking two snowballs at once. The one from her left hand missed by yards, but the one from her right hit David on the shoulder, breaking apart spectacularly. She cackled and ducked back down behind the makeshift protection, rolling several snowballs and stacking them. When she didn't hear any sounds of David doing the same preparations, she peeked her head up and barely had time to scream before a snowball exploded against her forehead. "Ugh, no fair!" she shouted, grabbing an armful of her weapons of choice and climbing back over the bank to chase David. At least 5 more snowballs hit him before he threw his hands up, laughing and sputtering and red to the tips of his ears. 

"Okay okay! I surrender!" 

Alexis paused, keeping her last snowball clutched tight just in case. David made no move to ambush her, so she slowly dropped it to the ground. "Truce," she said firmly, sticking out a gloved hand and trying her best to look like her father. For a second David looked down at her hand, and then he jumped forward, scooping Alexis up and dumping her onto the snowbank with a wild laugh. 

"_God, _David!" Alexis tried to sound annoyed, but she found that she didn't actually care that David had destroyed her afternoon's work. She couldn't remember the last time they'd spent any length of time together, and now she just wanted it to last for a little while longer. 

Once David stopped laughing enough to speak, he held out his bare hand, red and freezing. "Truce?" 

Rolling her eyes, Alexis put her gloved hand in his and let him pull her up. They walked toward the house in silence for a minute or two, and then Alexis turned and wrapped her arms around whatever part of David she could reach. David hesitated for just a second and then hugged her back. 

Once inside, they disappeared into different wings of the house and never mentioned it again.

*

** _Winter, 2016_ **

After a totally ridiculous year in her new life (had it really been a year? Time was so tricky to keep track of here) Alexis was thrilled to see the first snowfall in Schitt's Creek. She'd seen snow in the past years, but rarely gotten to go out into it. There was that one winter she'd spent locked in the penthouse of the cute little Slovakian ambassador, but of course he'd never let her go outside except when he wanted to take pictures of her on the balcony. And she'd seen snow through the windows of the private jet she'd taken with Evangeline Lilly, but then they went to Hawaii and Alexis ended up staying there until the summer. 

So when she stepped outside to go for her morning jog and saw everything coated in fresh white, Alexis clapped and giggled and ran back inside, hitting David's still-sleeping form. 

"Fuh-koff 'Lexis," David mumbled, burying his face deeper into his pillow. 

"_Da _-vid, come on! It snowed last night!" Alexis sat on the edge of his bed and started bouncing, going back to a trick she'd learned when they were kids.

With a grumble, David rolled onto his back and squinted down the bed at her. "And this means you have to accost me at ass o'clock in the morning?" 

"Ugh, fine, stay inside. You're like a little hermit man." 

Alexis changed from her jogging shoes to her winter boots and then headed out. Even this disgusting town looked beautiful when frosted over like this. Grinning, she bent down and scooped some snow into her bare hands and then threw it into the air, laughing as the snowflakes fell on top of her and clung to her hair and eyelashes.

As she looked around and tried to figure out where to go next, she heard the door behind her open. "It's not as horrifying as I imagined," came David's voice. Alexis turned and saw him in a toque and a heavy sweater. A split second look was enough to tell Alexis the sweater was one of David's lower-end ones, and she smiled sweetly.

"I bet the motel looks super pretty, go stand over there and tell me if I should take a picture." 

David looked back at her warily, and Alexis kept her best poker face (which was actually an amazing one, if her winnings after playing against the entire Mozambique embassy were any indicator). Finally David shrugged and walked to the other side of the parking lot, and Alexis immediately bent down and hastily made a snowball. After counting to three, she aimed and threw, cackling when the snowball made impact with David's back. He stumbled forward and then whipped around, his eyebrows looking even more comical than they usually did.

"What the _ fuck, _Alexis!"

Before he even finished the sentence, Alexis was making another snowball and throwing it. He dodged and then threw his hands up in front of him.

"Stop, oh my god!"

Alexis stomped a foot and pouted, flailing her hands. "Oh my god David stop being so dramatic! When's the last time you had a snowball fight? Something tells me your instagram model friends didn't love to get cold."

She watched David's mouth open and close a few times, and wondered if he was remembering a long-ago snowball fight between two kids with nothing to worry about. 

They stared at each other for a long moment, and then David shook his head and rolled his eyes. Signature move. She had him. At the exact same time they both ducked down, and David beat Alexis by half a second, hitting her in the leg right before she launched one that hit his arm.

Alexis wasn't sure how much time passed with them circling each other, giggling and hopping around, trying and failing to dodge each other's snowballs. By the time they stopped, they were both panting, sending puffs of breath into the cold air.

"Oh, wow! Kids, it looks like you've been having quite a time out here!" 

David and Alexis both turned to see their father standing in the door to his room in his ridiculous Ebenezer Scrooge nightgown. The sight sent them into a fresh burst of laughter, and then they locked eyes in a rare moment of speaking a language that only they could understand. In a flash they both armed themselves and sent two perfect snowballs hurtling through the air. One hit Johnny in the center of his chest, while the other managed to hit the exposed skin of his ankle. He hurried to close the door, leaving David and Alexis falling over each other as they tried to catch their breath.

"Oh my god, did you see his face?"

"I've never seen you hit something that dead on before!"

They laughed all the way inside, before fighting over who got to change and take a shower first.

The rest of the winter might be dreary and bleak and fitting of this town they now called home, but Alexis knew just like the snowball fight she'd had as a little girl, she'd remember this one perfect snowy day with her big brother.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr @thedidipickles and twitter @didipickles2


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